Along with the new J building at SJHHS, there are new procedures and occurrences with the parking lot.

During the construction of the J building during the 2016-2017 school year, the class of 2018 was denied permission to park in the student parking lot, besides a select few. The juniors and sophomores were left stranded for the rest of the school year.

Since then many complications have been cleared up; however, there are a few factors that still cause issues in the parking lot.

The final bell rings at 2:45pm and with only one entrance and exit to the school, the traffic to leave is monstrous. The line to leave the school takes a minimum of fifteen minutes and often times more.

Many students trip and fall after school because they sprint to their cars to beat the traffic. The fact that students are getting injured trying to rush to their cars is absurd.

“We just need a better system,” said Anam Faruqi, a senior, because “there is one exit and so many people trying to fit through it.” Before spending time and money on a new building, SJHHS should have considered creating an alternative entrance.

Not only are there limited routes to exit the school, but parents also add to the chaos by parking in the student parking lot.

“The parents make it take so long to leave school,” said Raabe. The time it takes to leave school is unnecessary stress piled on a student. “Parents just go into the student lot and sit there,” said Faruqi.

There is a separate lane for parents to pick up their kids, but the parents park in the students’ parking spots to try and get out quicker. There are cones that block the entrance to the parking lot, but the parents move the cones and cause more traffic and disarray for the students.

It already takes a tremendous time to leave the parking lot and adding the parents to the mix makes it worse. “I literally have to let like ten parents in front of me,” said Raabe.

Furthermore, since parents are not familiar with the merging system in which it goes every other person a couple students have been hit by parents.

Something needs to be done. “There needs to be proctors early to watch the lot,” said Faruqi.

Emails have been sent out by the school expressing that the parents cannot move the cones to access the student lot, but none of them take it seriously. A larger plan should be put in place to stop the traffic, chaos, and parents.